Pages

Thursday, 17 April 2014

Blog Tour: All Hallow's Night by Marie Hall

I received a copy of All Hallow's Night, book 2 in the Night series, in exchange for my review.

Having been to hell and back (literally), Pandora finds herself mourning the loss of her friend and in a state of confusion over her relationship with Luc, made even more worrying because her inner demon, Lust, seems to have retreated into herself for the first time in thousands of years. Cue running into Billy once more, except that he's not really Billy, and he no longer seems to be a Death Priest, and Pandora's love life just took centre stage. Or it would, if there wasn't a hive of zombies that she has to track down on the rampage in Mexico.

I really enjoyed Crimson Night when I read that, but All Hallow's Night was even better! There is a mix between some plotlines that are actually kind of serious and Pandora's internal monologue. Normally I'm not such a great fan of the talking to the audience thing, but in this book I just kept finding myself laughing at Pandora's asides! That gave some comic relief to what is quite an action packed and serious scenes.

There is a lot of chemistry between Pandora and Asher (or Billy, but like Pandora suspected, Billy was really called Asher) and the author managed that without much more than a kiss between the two of them (even more impressive when you consider that as a Lust demon, Pandora has to have sex to survive properly), but there was also a deep emotional connection that I thought was possible to feel from the page.

The lore and legends that surround the characters in All Hallow's Night were all so detailed and imaginative that it was possible to actually forget that they aren't real, and it's not just so for the main species involved in the plot (demons), but the more minor species too, in this book zombies. Though Asher and the rest of the Death Priests are still a bit of a mystery, but that worked!

You can't really read All Hallow's Night without reading Crimson Night though, you'd miss out on too many of the defining points in Pandora's history, and in her relationships with Luc and Asher. I'd even go as far as to say you can't read it without book 3 either, but that's not out yet!

Secrets and truths, lies and red herrings… which is which? That’s what Pandora’s trying to figure out. Ever since the death of her best, and probably only friend by her own hands, she’s not sure who to trust anymore. The Priest is dead. The Gray Man is… she’s not even sure what. Luc, well, Luc is Luc.

The Order has sent her deep into the heart of Mexico to investigate a potential zombie uprising. She arrives at the start of the Dia de los Muertos festival—a celebration for the dead and immediately things don’t feel right to her. For one, bodies (the living kind) keep disappearing. They’re not being kidnapped, no, if only things were that simple. Literally there one second, gone the next, she’s not sure what to make of it. On top of that mum’s are floating all over the place. Is that merely symbolism associated with the festival, or is it a clue of something far more sinister?

In this explosive sequel to the USA Today Bestselling, Crimson Night, an old ally returns and a shocking truth is revealed. One that will turn her investigation into The Order’s duplicity on its head and make Pandora question everything she ever thought she knew…

I’d meant to ask around town, see if any of the locals knew of or had heard about any recent or strange deaths, but I was a stranger to them. A gringa (white face), they wouldn’t trust me enough to answer me.
Part of Lust’s glamour was that I could turn myself into the walking embodiment of anybody’s deepest desire, but doing so also required that I had sex recently. A sort of tit for tat kind of arrangement.
But since that night and the possession of my third soul, Lust wasn’t working so well for me anymore. My desire for sex was practically nil. Luc was the first person I’d slept with since waking from my semi-coma, and even that had left me empty and cold.
I knew I should be a lot more worried than I actually was—I dunno, maybe Lust was still in shock after our stint in Hell. Meeting Wrath had done things to Lust, screwed with her head. She was like a whimpering, terrified dog tucking tail and hiding in a corner, and there wasn’t much I could do to bring her out.

So I had to do this sleuthing thing the good old-fashioned way. Being as old as I am, you get a feeling for people. The outer shell might be different, but the inside was always the same. If I wanted to find what I was looking for, I had to go someplace designed to loosen tongues and get men talking. Get a man drunk enough and he’ll tell you anything you want to know.Opening the door to the first dive I found in town, I entered and stood just inside as my eyes slowly adjusted to the dim lighting.

Get book 1, CRIMSON NIGHT Freewherever ebooks are sold.

Marie Hall is a New York Times and USA Today Bestselling author who loves books that make you think, or feel something. Preferably both. And while she's a total girly girl and loves glitter and rainbows, she's just as happy when she's writing about the dark underbelly of society. Well, if things like zombies, and vampires, and werewolves, and mermaids existed. (Although she has it on good authority that mermaids do in fact exist, because the internet told her so.)
She's married to the love of her life, a sexy beast of a caveman who likes to refer to himself as Big Hunk. She has two awesome kids, lives in Hawaii, loves cooking and occasionally has been known to crochet. She also really loves talking about herself in the third person.